Without any doubt, the seventh round of the Grand Prix happened to be the most exciting round here so far. Besides the theoretical clash of the leaders Harika Dronavalli and Kateryna Lagno, which finished with an early rather logical draw, none of the games had a predictable result. And after the principal battle of two former world champions, Antoaneta Stefanova and Alexandra Kosteniuk, finished in a draw with plenty of mistakes on both sides, one could have thought "OK, that was very exciting". But then we found ourselves watching how the lowest-rated Nafisa Muminova created a crucial attack on the king of the leader, top-seeded Humpy Koneru. However, the experience and steel nerves of the Indian helped her to fight back and outplay the Uzbek and once again get her sole leadership. Elina Danielian was celebrating her first victory in the tournament as she forced Zhao Xue to blunder in an uncomfortable position after an exchange sacrifice by Armenian. Ju Wenjun was stronger than Bela Khotenashvili to share with her the fourth place in the current standings. But "the sweetest treat" of the evening was the long battle of Guliskhan Nakhbayeva against Olga Girya, where the Russian after over 100 moves managed to convert a nearly equal endgame to her favor.

Kateryna Lagno enters the second half of FIDE Grand Prix in a good ood as she outplayed Antoaneta Stefanova to catch up the Indian leaders Humpy Koneru and Harika Dronavalli, who have signed a peace in their principal battle. Another national derby was an upset for Zhao Xue to Ju Wenjun having quite comfortable position after the opening. Alexandra Kosteniuk and Bela Khotenashvili won their games against Guliskhan Nakhbayeva and Olga Girya, while Nafisa Muminova drew against Elina Danielian.After six rounds Koneru, Dronavalli and Lagno are leading with 4.5 points, Knotenashvili is half a point behind, Zhao has 3.5.

The fifth round of Women's Grand Prix in Tashkent appeared to be ucky for the white side as five of the six games finished in favor of those who made the first move, and Antoaneta Stefanova managed to make a draw with the leader Humpy Koneru despite the Indian had a slightly better position. Harika Dronavalli outplayed Elina Danielian to catch up her compatriot with 4 points, Kateryna Lagno and Zhao Xue are half-point behind them after beating Alexandra Kosteniuk and Olga Girya. Bela Khotenashvili has "+1" after defeating Guliskhan Nakhbayeva, and we have to point out a triumph of Nafisa Muminova over Ju Wenjun, which moved the leader of Uzbek female team to the middle of the standings table.

The fourth round didn't change anything in the group of leaders: umpy Koneru and Harika Dronavalli drew with Kateryna Lagno and Ju Wenjun accordingly, another Chinese Zhao Xue was lucky to save the game against Guliskhan Nakhbayeva, and Elina Danielian couldn't get anything from the position with well defending Antoaneta Stefanova and also signed a piece. Russian players Alexandra Kosteniuk and Olga Girya managed to score the first full point each by winning their games against Bela Khotenashvili and Nafisa Muminova. Before the first free day Humpy Koneru is the sole leader with 3.5 points out of 4, Harika Dronavalli has 3, Zhao Xue and Kateryna Lagno - 2.5.The full standings table is avaliable here. Pictures of the 4th round and press conferences.

In the third round all the games were resultative. Indian players umpy Koneru and Harika Dronavalli quite confidently won their games with white pieces against Russians Alexandra Kosteniuk and Olga Girya accordingly. Humpy became the sole leader with 3 points, Harika is half-point behind her. Bela Khotenashvili overplayed Zhao Xue to join her on 3rd place together with Kateryna Lagno, who managed to score a point against Elina Danielian.Antoaneta Stefanova lost control on the game in a completely winning situation against Ju Wenjun, and the Chinese used this mistake to outplay and join Bulgarian with 50 percent of points. Finally Nafisa Muminova cheered up the Uzbek supporters by beating her long-time opponent at the Asian tournaments Guliskhan Nakhbayeva from Kazakhstan.